


Stay Up All Night With The Stars

by starrywrite



Category: Video Blogging & YouTube RPF
Genre: Existential Crisis, Existentialism, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-21
Updated: 2014-05-21
Packaged: 2018-01-26 01:09:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1669148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starrywrite/pseuds/starrywrite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once there was a boy, and the boy loved the stars very much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stay Up All Night With The Stars

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sohmaskyos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sohmaskyos/gifts).



> hello friends!! okay so i’m working on a different fic at the moment (which i’m roughly… halfway through? give or take a few thousand more words tbh) but i haven’t been feeling too great over the past few days, due to some life shit and me being stupid and my brain being weird and yeah, i just hasn’t been okay for a while now and i decided that, instead of doing something desctructive, i should do something productive and i wrote this!! so yeah, for the most part this was rly self indulgent but also theraputic in a way and yeah here is this thing!
> 
> this was also inspired by a this post (http://howellsprincess.tumblr.com/post/85860330725) and combined that with my love of phan and my love of the stars. 
> 
> also i know i say this a lot, but i really have to thank Alex (who is basically Phil in his fic) for being there for me a lot over the past few days, i know i was probably super annoying but she never made me feel like i was being annoying and she was always there to make me feel better. and i hope she knows how much i love her, because i lover her a lot :) 
> 
> and yeah, this was rly long soz okay onto the fic i i hope you enjoy!!

There are more stars in the sky than there are grains of sand on the beach, and Dan looks up at the thousands and thousands among millions and millions of stars in the sky and _wow_. While he can almost barely see them past the London smog and bright city lights, Dan knows that they’re there. And the thought alone is almost comforting; it’s the feeling of knowing something is there and will always be there even though you can’t see it or physically feel it, it’s nice. Because it’s constant and Dan likes having something constant in his life, and it’s dependable and Dan can depend on the fact that no matter what, there will always be stars in the sky. It’s like being alone without the actual commitment of loneliness.

Loneliness…

It’s known that there’s power in numbers, and while no one knows the total number of stars in the sky, everyone knows there are more than could be counted. And looking up at the thousands and thousands among millions and millions of stars in the sky above him, Dan can’t help but to feel alone sometimes, because there’s so many of them, and only one of him. Sometimes he feel really small too - which makes sense because stars come in all kinds of sizes, and in retrospect, they’re already much bigger than us - but there’s something about looking up and seeing them all up there that makes him feel… small. Insignificant. 

Dan pushes up the window and removes the screen, and he doesn’t care about bugs or thugs getting inside because he just wants to look at the stars. He gingerly sits, his body angled so even if he slips, he’ll fall into the sink and not plummet to his death, and he lets his head stick out as far as he can manage, and he looks up past the London smog and the bright city lights, and he looks at the stars. They’re so beautiful, all of them. And there’s so many of them, and they cover the sky completely, touching every inch of the world from end to end. 

Dan wants to touch every inch of the world, maybe not physically, but spiritually because he wants to make an impact and he wants to matter. Because what’s the point in living life if you aren’t doing something significant or brilliant or beautiful with your life? 

Dan isn’t significant or brilliant or beautiful. He’s just…. Dan. He isn’t doing anything worthy with his life, he’s just wasting his days away until he inevitably dies and that’s no way to live. He can’t keep living like this, like he isn’t doing anything important, like he isn’t doing anything worth living for, but he can’t change it. He’s stuck like this, in his vortex of waking up, getting on his laptop, doing his meaningless day-to-day activities until he finds himself lying in bed at night, waiting for sleep to take over and take him away from the misery that is his mind. 

He’s stupid, he’s annoying, he’s worthless, he’s irrelevant, he’s insignificant, he doesn’t want to exist, he doesn’t have the _courage_ to exist. Because when the going gets tough, Dan gets going. He can’t deal, he can’t fucking deal with anything and everything, and god, he just wants it to stop. Why won’t it stop? Why can’t he shut his mind up? Why can’t he stop hating everything about himself and everything he does? Why can’t he just be fucking happy? 

When Dan looks up at the stars, he wishes he was a star. Not many people realized this, but stars are more than just stars. Stars were self destructive; they could, in fact, be destroyed, but only by themselves. Over the years one of two things could happen. One, stars could get bigger and bigger, until they turned into a red giant or supergiant, and eventually exploded. Or two, the opposite could happen; stars could shrink into an immensely dense neutron star and collapse into a black hole. It took time, but eventually, the stars would destroy themselves until they were nothing, until nothing was left.

Ironically enough, stars were strong - strong enough to rip themselves apart. The strongest centers of gravity are black holes, but stars harness a kind of power that couldn’t be understood. Why did they destroy themselves? Why did they let themselves get bigger and bigger until they exploded? Why did they shrink into themselves until they just got lost in the entire essence of everything? Why did they choose to use their strength towards something so… so tragic?

Stars were monstrous, they were exploited, they were unappreciated… but the thing was, no one realized it. When people looked at the stars in the sky, they just saw the beautiful, twinkling diamonds of the night high above their heads. They didn’t see what was really there; they didn’t see how destructive the stars were. And in a way, stars were a lot like people. On the surface, everything appeared to be perfect; but deep down to the core, everything was just a mess. When people look at the stars, they only see the beautiful diamonds of the sky, and everything else about them is just overlooked. And just like stars, when it comes to people, everyone overlooks the surface problems, and just focuses on the pretty things to look at.

And what happens when they self-destruct? Nothing.

When the stars eventually explode or shrink into a black hole, it can’t be helped. It’s just something that happens - and no one bats an eye. No one would remember the old star, and after a while, they’ll be replaced - which makes sense; after all, they are just stars.

Except, they’re not just stars to Dan, they’re so much more than that and he doesn’t know why but they are. And when he looks up at the stars in the sky, the thousands and thousands among millions and millions of stars in the sky, he sees so much more than what there is. Maybe because, when people look at him, he wants them to see so much more than what there really is.

“Dan?” he barely flinches when he hears Phil’s sleepy voice break the silence. “It’s three in the morning, what are you doing?”

“Stargazing.” Dan says simply, but he drags himself back inside, he puts the screen back on the window even though the next night he’ll just take it out again, and he closes the window. He sits on the countertop, and he looks at Phil. “Hi.”

“Hi.” Phil says. “You’ve really got to stop doing this; you need to go to bed at a normal hour.”

“There’s a lot of things I need to do.” Dan tells him. “A lot of things I’m not doing.”

“What’s wrong?” Phil asks, because he recognizes the tone in Dan’s voice; he’s heard it a hundred time before.

“Nothing. Everything.” Dan sighs, and he presses his palms to his eyes. “I just… I don’t matter. And I know I’ve told you this a million times before, but it’s true I don’t matter. I’m not a star in the sky, I’m just a grain of sand on the beach, and who gives a fuck about the grains of sand on the beach when there are stars in the sky?”

“Because who like the beach care.” Phil tells him.

“Do they really? Do people really care?” Dan asks him. “In the whole scope of the universe, who even cares about anything? Who cares about me?”

“I care about you.” Phil says immediately.

“I don’t.” Dan shakes his head. “I don’t care about me. I don’t care about me at all - I mean, fuck, what is there to even care about? What’s there to even like about me? I’m always stressed, I’m always depressed, I’m always anxious, I’m always whining to you about my stupid problems. I’m just worthless, I’m so worthless. As in, I have no worth. Why do I bother getting up in the morning when I’m not doing anything remotely relevant with my life? I spend every single day just being a waste of space.”

“Dan, please just calm down -”

“I’m sorry.” Dan groans. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, god I don’t know how you even put up with me, I’m so annoying and whiny and I never shut up -”

“Shut up.” Phil says, and Dan stares at him, startled. “Sorry, but I couldn’t get a word in edgewise.” the older boy explains, and he crosses the kitchen to stand before Dan, placing his hands on his hips, holding him, and he tells him, “You aren’t insignificant. You aren’t worthless, and you aren’t a waste of space. You’re Dan, you’re _my_ Dan; you’re the love of my life and my best friend and the most important person to me. How could you ever think that you are anything less than what you really are?” Dan doesn’t say anything, and Phil presses his forehead to his and he say, “I love you.”

“Don’t.” Dan says. “I’m a mess.”

“So am I,” Phil counters. “But you still love me.”

“Because you’re the best person ever.” Dan says softly. “You’re beautiful and smart and perfect, and I’m just sad and stressed and annoying.”

“No, you’re not. You’re Dan.” Phil says, and he laces their fingers together. “You’re an amazing person, and I love you so much, so shut up for two seconds and just listen to me.” Phil brings Dan’s hand up to his mouth and he kisses each knuckle before kissing the back of his palm, and he says, “You are beautiful, and you’re brilliant. You are the center of your own universe, the center of your own existence, and that makes you so important, okay?”

“I don’t want to exist sometimes.” Dan says in a small voice.

“I know.” Phil replies. “But I want you to exist all of the time.” and Phil kisses his forehead, then he kisses his nose, and he kisses his lips, and Dan wants to cry because Phil loves him so much. Because sometimes Dan feels worthless and insignificant and annoying and stupid, and Phil still loves him. And Dan doesn’t know what he did to deserve Phil in his life, but he’s glad he did it. Phil is his north star, the brightest star in his sky.


End file.
